The macro photo gallery now features photographs without watermarks and right-click protection. You are welcome to use and share all photographs on floriansphotos as long as it is for non-commercial purposes without modification of the original artwork and with attribution to Florian Freimoser and www.floriansphotos.com.
I have indicated in an earlier post (a thorn in my side) that I may remove the watermarks and change the copyright status of my photographs sometime. Watermarks, copy protections and copyright statements are a reflex action to prevent that others profit commercially from your work without your consent. However, as with many things, there are two sides to the story. Restricting access and limiting online distribution of my photographs certainly harms the goal to show my photographs online to as many people as possible. Therefore, I have become interested in Creative Commons and I am now putting all my photographs under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 Unported License. This license is symbolized with the following button:
BY = Attribution: Florian Freimoser and www.floriansphotos.com must be acknowledged with each photograph.
NC = Non-commercial: The photographs are free to be used for private and non-commercial purposes only. If you are in doubt about the meaning of what "non-commercial" means, if you would like to license a photograph for commercial use or if you want to acquire a limited-edition print, please contact me. I am very understanding and flexible to provide a license that will suit your needs.
ND = No derivative work: You are not allowed to modify my photographs in any form without my explicit written consent. Again, I am flexible and likely to welcome your plan, but I want to be informed about the intended modification and the context in which my work will be exhibited.
This creative commons license permits, for example, the use of my photographs for blog posts, online articles, for school or university projects or the personal use as a desktop background of your monitor. The term "commercial" is not clearly defined. If in doubt whether or not your use is considered commercial, please contact me. Examples of commercial use are marketing, fund-rising or advertisement campaigns for profit or non-profit organizations, use on commercial webpages or prints for private or public display. All photographs are available for commercial licensing and, in very limited availability, as custom made classical photo prints in finishing and sizes of your choice. If you are interested, please inquire about a commercial license or prints. Likewise, please contact me if you require a larger version of a photograph or if you would like to create a derivative work of one of the photographs. The license does not allow creation of derivative work from my photographs, but depending on your project I may allow such use.
I have been thinking and reading about creative commons for photography and sharing for a while. Trey Ratcliff is a very fervent proponent of creative commons licensing and I have high regards for his open approach and honest communication. Chris Folsom has also convincingly defended Creative Commons for photographers and many more photographers and websites use Creative Commons. Flickr is famous for its creative commons licensing (and certainly also profits hugely from it) and the BY-NC-ND license is the second most frequently chosen license at the moment. On the other hand, critical voices proclaim that Creative Commons does not fit and neither make sense for photography and even presume and suggest that photographers hate Creative Commons. Obviously, I do not share these views.
I hope that some of you appreciate the more open display or at least the disappearance of the watermarks.
Have a great week!
